Sitting in the west of Coventry in the West Midlands, Tile Hill occupies a stretch of land that once formed part of the ancient Forest of Arden. Pockets of that woodland survive today between the built-up streets, most notably Plants Hill Wood to the south of Tile Hill Lane and Pig Wood to the north. The suburb borders Lime Tree Park to the east, Eastern Green to the north, and Canley to the south, with the southwestern edge meeting the Metropolitan Borough of Solihull. Tile Hill railway station, on the West Coast Main Line, gives residents direct connections to both Birmingham and London.
Layout and Neighbourhoods
Tile Hill Lane roughly splits the suburb into two halves. To the north lies Tile Hill North, a largely postwar social housing area stretching out to Broad Lane and beyond Banner Lane, with the exception of Nutbrook Avenue. South of the lane, Tile Hill South is made up mostly of private housing running down to the railway line. At the western edge of the city, Tile Hill Village is the more prosperous part of the suburb and forms the main gateway towards Burton Green in Warwickshire and the Solihull Borough. The Tanyard Farm area, built in the early 1980s, extends Tile Hill Village northward and westward towards Eastern Green. The suburb is primarily residential, though industrial land and patches of common ground are also present throughout.
Schools, Colleges, and Local Landmarks
Tile Hill has two secondary schools: Finham Park 2 and West Coventry Academy. Several primary and junior schools serve younger pupils, including Limbrick Wood Primary School, Leigh Church of England Junior School, and Our Lady of the Assumption Catholic Junior School. Hereward College, a further education college for students with disabilities, is also based in the area. Tile Hill once had its own college too – Tile Hill College merged with Coventry Technical College in 2002 to form Coventry College, which has since relocated to a purpose-built campus near Swanswell Pool close to Coventry city centre, with the former buildings on the Tile Hill site demolished. One of the suburb’s more notable recent changes involves the former Massey Ferguson factory, which closed in 2003. Its prominent 16-storey 1970s office tower was demolished on 8 July 2012, and the wider site has been cleared to make way for a mixed-use development combining housing with a science and technology park of small industrial units.